Domestic range hoods having a pair of motors horizontally installed in a motor housing within the hood body are used above cooking surfaces to remove grease, common odors and hazardous gases created during the cooking process. A fan is connected to each of the motors. The fans suck air from the cooking area below and force it through the motor housing to ventilation piping.
Efforts have been made to produce a thinner range hood. Generally, the extent to which the size of the range hood can be reduced has been limited by the size of the motor housing within the range hood and the size of the grease tray connected below the housing. A prior art design for a range hood 10 is shown in FIG. 1. The motor housing 12 is divided into two substantially similar chambers and has a pair of circular walls 14 extending into the interior of the motor housing 12 (one for each chamber, only one of which is shown). The openings defined by walls 14 are dimensioned to allow the fans 16 to be removable from the motor housing interior.
The presence of the circular walls 14 prevents grease within the motor housing from draining back out through the opening. Instead, grease within the motor housing is directed to drainage hole located in the general area marked with reference numeral 18 where it travels to an external grease cup 20. Because most of the grease collects in and drains from the motor housing, very little grease collects in tray 22. Tray 22 acts mainly to control the airflow into the fan. While the combination of wall 14 and tray 22 does restrict most of the air drawn into fan 16 to that from outside of the range hood, some air from within the motor housing is able to pass from within the motor housing back to the fan as illustrated by arrow 24. This reduces the overall suction power and efficiency of the range hood.
In addition, as best shown in FIGS. 2 and 3, fan 16 is attached to motor 11 and secured in place by way of fan cap 26. The shaft 28 of the motor 11 fits within a channel 30 passing through the fan 16. The threaded portion 29 of shaft 28 extends below the channel 30 such that fan cap 26 may be screwed on. A torsional member 32 fits within a recess in the fan so that rotational force may be transferred from the motor 11 to the fan 16. However, because the shaft 28 and fan cap 26 extend below the level of the motor housing, the fan grill 34 must be conical in shape in order to allow sufficient space. As the vaporized grease contained in the entrained air passes by the fan grill 34 some of the grease condenses on the bars of the grill. Grease collecting on the grill drains along the bars of the grill to the lowest point until there is sufficient grease to form a drop. In order to prevent grease from dripping off the grill, an additional grill tray 36 is required. This must be removed and cleaned periodically and adds to the manufacturing costs.
It is therefore an object of an embodiment of the invention to provide a range hood that does not require a grill tray.
It is a further object of an embodiment of the present invention to provide a range hood, which has increased suction power over prior art range hoods of the same size.
It is a further object of an embodiment of the invention to provide a thinner range hood as compared to similar prior art range hoods.
Various aspects of the invention address these objects, but not all aspects of the invention necessarily address all such objects simultaneously. Other objects of the invention will be apparent from the description that follows.